One of the first things I did when I arrived at Teal Bend Golf Club was spray the tree bases for weeds. Nothing can bring down the looks of an otherwise tidy course than weeds and scraggly grass at the base of trees. In order to help my spray technician apply herbicide in a perfect circle of consistent size I fabricated a simple device. For lack of a better name I call it “the dead ringer.”
It simply consists of a steel hook and a piece of rope with a loop on the end. The steel hook is hooked around the tree and the end of the paint gun goes in the loop. Then all you do is pull the rope tight and pull the trigger as you walk around the tree, painting a perfect circle. You just have to decide how large of a diameter you prefer around your tree bases.
Most of my trees are young and have trunk sizes of around six to 12 inches and are generally 10 to 20 feet tall. For those trees I use a section of rope one and a half feet long, giving me a ring of three feet across. This is proportionally correct and gives the mowers ample room to work, allowing them to stay away from the tree’s base.
When it comes to the native valley oaks, I like to come all the way out to the drip line of the tree’s outer canopy. In fact the course’s EIR (Environmental Impact Report) requires us to keep all turf and irrigation away from these particular trees. For those situations I pull a section of rope out to the drip line and boom, there’s my radius.
It simply consists of a steel hook and a piece of rope with a loop on the end. The steel hook is hooked around the tree and the end of the paint gun goes in the loop. Then all you do is pull the rope tight and pull the trigger as you walk around the tree, painting a perfect circle. You just have to decide how large of a diameter you prefer around your tree bases.
Most of my trees are young and have trunk sizes of around six to 12 inches and are generally 10 to 20 feet tall. For those trees I use a section of rope one and a half feet long, giving me a ring of three feet across. This is proportionally correct and gives the mowers ample room to work, allowing them to stay away from the tree’s base.
When it comes to the native valley oaks, I like to come all the way out to the drip line of the tree’s outer canopy. In fact the course’s EIR (Environmental Impact Report) requires us to keep all turf and irrigation away from these particular trees. For those situations I pull a section of rope out to the drip line and boom, there’s my radius.
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